The global pandemic has had a permanently altering effect on the workforce, and as a result, the world is facing a labour shortage. The past two years have delivered a new reality for employers across almost every industry — one in which finding the workers is a challenge despite inflated unemployment rates.
Slow adoption of vaccinations along with changed customer and employee preferences are just a couple of the factors that may seem out of your control. Luckily, there are technological solutions ready to aid you in returning your business to pre-pandemic prosperity and beyond as we move into the future.
The Changing Landscape of Work
In the lockdown era of 2020, in-person jobs all but disappeared, with remote work taking its place whenever possible. While this was a necessity then, it has now shifted into a preference, making it difficult for employers to find new workers in places such as the hospitality and manufacturing industries.
Continued fear of contagion keeps would-be employees away, with many of the unemployed reskilling to enter completely different jobs than before. The result is competition between industries for this new, changeable workforce who can be swayed in any direction that offers a good wage and flexible options.
Increasing wages is one obvious way to attract workers to industries associated with a higher risk of exposure. Risk of COVID-19 elevates the reservation wage — the minimum amount of compensation a worker requires in order to accept a job — and the trend continues to be a preference for lower risk positions, particularly those that offer remote work options.
If your industry often relies on migrant workers, then closed borders and increased restrictions across the board have no doubt made a huge impact as well. All this leaves employers in need of new strategies to navigate the changed landscape of work.
Solutions for Employers
While contributing factors like the dissemination of vaccines are a national matter, strategies like increased wages and offering of flexible work arrangements in industries that allow remote work will be useful for employers in desperate need of workers. But beyond these more obvious points, there are other ways you can take action and future-proof your business from these shifts in the labour landscape.
Rather than trying to bring more in, you can invest in labour-saving technologies that will boost the productivity of your existing employees. The benefits of employer investment into new equipment and software in countries with a volatile labour force are already being seen.
Through digital transformation and outsourcing, employers can save time, effort, and money across a wide variety of applications. Staff augmentation can mean streamlined processes in IT, digital marketing, and other important business functions like financial planning and engineering.
Why Outsourcing?
Given the massive shifts of unemployed workers to different industries, finding experts and people with proper experience for critical positions has become more of a challenge than ever — an issue that can be solved by staff augmentation.
Outsourcing gives you access to expertise right away. For example, a digital marketing team can handle search engine optimization (SEO), social media management, and sophisticated web design. As a group of hired professionals, they provide instant access to the best business-growing solutions. And as an extension of your team, digital marketers deliver custom-designed services tailored to the needs and objectives of your unique business model.
In today’s tech-based world, IT is critical to the success of most businesses, with areas like cybersecurity and network management being the key to a smooth-running operation free of errors. With the unstable nature of the job market, through outsourcing you can be sure that you’ll get a team of dedicated and qualified individuals who will be able to deliver the services your organization requires in order to thrive.
If compromising quality is not an option for you, then it’s a great avenue to investigate. From data engineers to database admins and help desk technicians, your technological requirements can easily be met by tapping into the wealth of expertise offered by an outsourced team of certified professionals.
Thriving in the Future Job Landscape
There’s no question that the labour shortage currently being faced is a complicated matter, with both governments and individual workers having their own roles to play. As a business owner, raising wages and offering more flexible work plans and arrangements play an important part in continuing the growth of your operations.
One of the most promising options for prosperity, however, is outsourcing and using the power of staff augmentation to streamline business processes and maximize both efficiency and profitability. As an extension of your team, these trained professionals can lessen the burden of the labour shortage and help future-proof your business.